


...and I Get to be Chained to You

by Hours_Gone_By



Series: Trope Bingo Round Twelve [3]
Category: Transformers - Aligned Continuity Family, Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: Enemies, Gen, Handcuffed Together, MECH Tech, On the Run, Road Trips, Trope Bingo Round 12
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-23
Updated: 2019-01-27
Packaged: 2019-10-14 19:41:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17514743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hours_Gone_By/pseuds/Hours_Gone_By
Summary: June had planned to attend her high school reunion. Instead, she’s wound up on the run from MECH while helping the Decepticon who once kidnapped her and stuffed her in his trunk. Oh, and a piece of MECH tech has wrapped itself around her arm and won’t release. Fantastic.The road trip no one involved wanted to take.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Note: Written for [Trope Bingo](https://trope-bingo.dreamwidth.org) [Round 12](https://trope-bingo.dreamwidth.org/tag/round+twelve). Prompt: Handcuffed/bound together. Also used Prompt #9 from 100 Themes: Drive

June pushed her bangs out of her face and took the exit ramp to the restaurant whose signs she’d seen for the past couple of miles. It was a long drive from Jasper to her high school reunion in Carson City, and she could use a stretch, a bathroom, and some lunch and a cup of coffee. It felt good to be here on her own, her hair down and wearing something other than scrubs and sensible shoes for once. It was amazing how a pair of jeans, chandelier earrings, and some sandals could make her feel ten years younger. She was so used to being in her work clothes she almost never took them off.

She pulled into the restaurant’s parking lot a couple of minutes after taking the turnoff, just behind a dark-coloured Humvee. The other car pulled around to the other side of the lot, and she parked closer to the front of the building. The restaurant was bustling, not surprising given it was near a busy highway at lunchtime, but the waitress found a two-top in a corner for her. It was small, but at least it had a view; she could see the whole restaurant and most of the parking lot out of the plate glass windows along the far wall.

She also had the leaf of a fake plant hovering near her ear, probably why the location wasn’t in high demand. June nudged the plant pot away with her foot, looking down to gauge the distance. Looking back up, she was just in time to see two men in dark clothes and ballcaps take a seat on the opposite side of the restaurant. They weren’t looking at her, but something about them made her uncomfortable, made her not want to risk catching their attention. June pulled her current book out of her purse and kept her head down, reading. Hey, she needed to catch up on her reading anyway, right? What with the teenager and the giant aliens she’d fallen behind.

June ate her vegetarian club sandwich (multigrain toast, no mayo) while trying to get lost in the drama of _The Thirty-Nine Steps **.**_  The two conspicuously-inconspicuous men across the room always hovered on the edge of her awareness, though, and she kept glancing up. That was why she saw them watching the cherry-red Aston Martin that sat in the parking lot, as she was putting down cash for the bill. One of them made a too-quick, too-quiet call on his cell in a way that set her personal alarm bells – finely tuned after decades of looking after patients and raising a kid – ringing. She _knew_ that Aston Martin and she didn’t think that the Plainclothes Guys had just a car lover’s interest in it. June dropped her book back into her purse and followed the two men out. _Maybe_ they worked for Bill, but she didn’t think so.

Heart in her throat, June approached the men and the sports car. One of the men was trying to open the driver’s side door, shielding way too much of it to be trying to open it with a key, and Knock Out – if it _was_ Knock Out, didn’t so much as try to pull away.

June decided: if this was just a car, then some poor bastard was about to get carjacked in broad daylight; if it were Knock Out, then…then no matter what he’d done he _still_ didn’t deserve to wind up in the hands of guys June was pretty sure were MECH agents.

“Hey!” she shouted before she could think any further about it. “You! Get away from my car! Yeah, you heard me!” she added when they started and looked over, the attention she was drawing making her a little braver. “Paws off!”

“Everything okay, lady?” someone called from across the parking lot, and June silently blessed whoever they were for not falling for the Bystander Effect.

True to form, once one person did something it caught the attention of others. “You alright?” someone else called.

“Sorry,” one of the men said, holding up his hands defensively. “Wrong car. Our mistake.”

They backed off, and as they retreated June saw something glinting on the ground next to the car, the one she was pretty sure was a Decepticon and what was she _doing_? Whatever it was, she couldn’t leave a potential MECH device lying around in public, so she quickly crouched down and picked it up. She could show it to Ratchet later, hear him scoff about human technology and tell her it was nothing. June was almost looking forward to it.

As one of the people who’d yelled out on her behalf came over and checked that she was okay, June saw the Humvee taking off, and she was pretty sure that someone noted the license plate number. Someone else asked her if she wanted to call the police. June declined, knowing that would cause even more trouble and hoping she could just get to a quiet place and call Bill for help. She had no idea what else to do with a terrorist group’s technology in her purse and a, strangely silent, possible Decepticon idling next to her. The unusually quiet Decepticon she’d just claimed was hers, and who those men would probably come back for once she was gone. Now what was she going to do?

“Thank you, thank you so much for checking on me,” June thanked the people who were checking on her. “I’m fine, now, really. No harm done. Thank you. Thank you.”

They finally left, leaving her feeling a little guilty for not being more grateful people had, for once, responded to someone who seemed to be in distress. She pulled out her cell to call Bill and –

“Oh, really!” she muttered. “A busy signal? Come on!”

She tried a few more times, turning in a little half-circle as she waited for Agent Fowler to finally pick up, and saw that she was being watched from inside. Probably they were wondering why she wasn’t driving away. Great, something else to explain. Maybe, if she had a reason to go back inside, she could – she didn’t know – hide out in the ladies’ room until the excitement died down and she could slip out? June slipped her cell back in her jeans pocket and pretended to rummage inside her purse for her keys. She could pretend she’d lost them and go back inside to look…

June’s wrist brushed up against the MECH device, and it suddenly snapped closed around her arm.

June breathed a word she would have grounded Jack for using. She didn’t want to stand in the parking lot and try to remove it, so she headed back inside. She could get free of this in the bathroom, pretend to find her keys and then – well, she’d think of something. Get some tea to calm her nerves, maybe. That at least wouldn’t be any kind of pretense.

Leaving Knock Out to do – whatever it was he was doing, June headed back into the restaurant. Once she got inside, hand still in her purse to hide the bracelet she hadn’t had earlier, her new jewelry began to vibrate against her wrist. That couldn’t be anything good, and June really hoped there'd be a free stall in the bathroom, so she could get rid of it in peace. But as she got further from Knock Out the device’s vibrations started to be audible – and attention-getting.

Thinking fast, June pretended to answer her phone as she turned and headed back out the door. The hostess looked at her curiously. June moved her phone away from her mouth and held up her keys to indicate she’d found what she’d been looking for.

“Thought I’d lost them,” she whispered by way of explanation. The waitress smiled and nodded in understanding. June escaped out the door before she could ask why her phone was still making noise. The noise stopped at about the same place it had started, and the vibration dialled itself down.

Okay, so. Pretty obvious that this thing, whatever it was, it didn’t like being away from Knock Out. Great. June had no idea how to get out of this one. She was nearly back to Knock Out now and swore she saw the Decepticon – relax on his wheels? Well, if this _wasn’t_ Knock Out then at least her imagination was alive and well.

Her phone rang, and she nearly fumbled it in her eagerness to answer. “Agent Fowler?”

The drawl that answered instead froze her in her tracks. “ _Sorry_ , but I’m _not_ your boyfriend.”

Knock Out. Of course. June didn’t know why she was surprised. “What do you want?”

“What I _want_ doesn’t come into it, fleshie. It’s what I need.”

Who knew experience dealing with teenage sulks would come in handy when talking to a who-knew-how-old alien who’d kidnapped her once? And what had happened to her life to put her in a place where that sentence made sense? “Alright, then, what do you need?”

Knock Out, apparently not as concerned as the Autobots with blending in, swung his door open. “Get in. I’ll tell you on the way.”

Well, _that_ wasn’t suspicious at all. Not to mention what her last trip with Knock Out had been like. June balked. “On the way to _where_?”

A sound remarkably like a sigh sounded in her ear. “Does it matter? It’s not _here_. Unless you want to stay and have a nice little _chat_ with your MECH friends, who are circling back right now and _eager_ to talk to you. It’s a limited time offer, human!”

Knock Out wasn’t wrong; a quick look up and down the highway and June could see the Humvee in the distance, pulled over on the side of the road and waiting. She didn’t know if the men inside were waiting for backup or waiting for an appropriate moment to come back. If she called Agent Fowler for back up it would take them time to get here. If she got hold of the Autobots they risked having to break their cover and that would create even more problems down the road.

Knock Out had been terrifying but he hadn’t really hurt her, even though at the end there it had been due to Wheeljack’s interference. MECH had handed her over to a giant mechanical spider-woman for torture and eventual death.

There were innocent people in the restaurant in danger, she risked her Jack being left an orphan, not knowing what had happened to her – or worse, _knowing_. She could run, but this stupid machine on her arm would sound off again, and –

“Oh, dammit!” she muttered and got into the Decepticon, her skin crawling. She’d wanted to read _The Thirty-Nine Steps_ , not live it! “Well, at least I’m not in the trunk this time.”

“Ye-es,” Knock Out drawled, voice coming from inside him this time; she hung her phone up automatically. “We’ve seen how well that little trick works, haven’t we?” The seatbelt snapped tight around her as he backed up, heading back to the highway. “Pay attention, human, and I’ll tell you what’s going on. Think you can manage that?”

June folded her arms and glared in the general direction of the dashboard. “My name is June.” Why in hell was she telling him that?

“You’d be surprised to learn just how much _I don’t_ _care_.” Knock Out continued as he drove, not letting her get a word in. “Those MECH agents tagged me with something during a drag race – _which_ I was winning. It did something to my systems, and now I can’t transform. I can’t go back to the Decepticons like this, not after – “ he broke off, and June wondered why. “Anyway, I can’t go back until I’m fixed and for that…”

“For that, you need the Autobot’s help,” June finished. “But why help me get away from MECH? Because I helped you?”

Knock Out made a sound remarkably like a snort. “That’s what you’re asking? No questions about the shiny new accessory you picked up?”

He went silent until, finally, it was June’s turn to sigh. “Okay, I’ll bite. What’s up with the…thingy those guys dropped?”

“That ‘thingy’ as you call it is some kind of control device. I’m not sure even those MECH idiots know how it works since the one who dropped it couldn’t even manage to get my door open again. I don’t know why it wasn’t screaming away when they were in that restaurant,” Knock Out continued. “Maybe they shut it off or increased the range or something. The point is if we get too far away from each other, it rattles you, and it locks my brakes, so I can’t move.”

“And you can’t undo it unless you can transform,” June finished. She wondered if it wasn’t that MECH didn’t understand their own technology or if they’d gotten rattled by having attention drawn to them in a public place. “You need me to call Ratchet, don’t you?”

“Unless I want to get zapped and you want to shake, rattle, and roll for the rest of your life…” He made a resigned noise. “…yes.”

“Okay,” June slipped automatically into her ‘nurse voice,’ the one she used to explain procedures to patients. “Find somewhere secluded, and I’ll call Ratchet for a ground bridge. He can take you back to their base and – “

Knock Out made a sound like a buzzer, cutting her off. “Wrong! If you think I’m rolling one _tread_ into the enemy headquarters, you’ve got another think coming. Ratchet can pack up a medical kit and come to _me_.”

“Okay, okay,” June agreed hastily. Knock Out might not be in robot form right now, but she knew that didn’t make him harmless. “That’s what we’ll do. Meet up with Ratchet. It – it shouldn’t be a problem.”

She hoped it wouldn’t be a problem, at least. Knock Out didn’t have to let her out, after all, and she had no idea how far he could travel before he had to refuel. June decided to go along with what he wanted until Ratchet could get to them and get her out.

“I don’t actually have a direct line to Ratchet. I’ll have to call,” she cut herself off before she could say ‘my son’ or use Jack’s name. The less Knock Out knew about her the better off, and safer, she and the children, and everyone else would be. “I’ll have to call someone else and get them to ask.”

“Fine, fine. Whatever. Call whoever you need to, just get me back into root mode!”

June unlocked her cell phone and brought up her contacts. Ratchet had done something to her cell phone he said would secure it against any human attempts to hack it or listen in on her conversations. It helped her sleep better, knowing that MECH wouldn’t be able to track her via her phone or listen in on her conversations. Of course, Ratchet had also said any _human_ attempts, but she tried not to think about that part of it. If she worried too much about what the Decepticons could, might, be doing, if they even thought about her, she’d drive herself to a nervous breakdown.

“Whatever you say, remember I can hear it,” Knock Out warned her. “Don’t try anything. I can still change my mind and call _Soundwave_ for a ground bridge instead.”

Soundwave, who Jack had told her had a picture of him, Raf, and Miko. June didn’t know how Soundwave felt about humanity, but she knew she didn’t want to find out. She had enough nightmares about being captured by Decepticons - one of which she was living _right now_ – she didn’t need anymore.

Jack’s phone went straight to voicemail. Of course; his lunch break was over, and he’d be back in class. _Dammit_.

“No luck?” Knock Out didn’t sound pleased.

“No, not yet. Just – “ Maybe Miko was skipping school? If she were at the base during school hours, Ratchet or Optimus would probably send her back but if she was with Bulkhead then at least the Autobot could contact Ratchet for her. “Let me try another number.”

Oh, please let Miko pick up! June didn’t know if Miko would answer a call from her, but it was her best option if Jack’s phone was off. Raf was too obedient a student to have his phone on during class, and if she called Agent Fowler, he’d probably have to report it. Bill’s superiors learning a Decepticon was in any kind of contact with the Autobots – June didn’t think that could end well. She had an idea, especially after the destruction of their original base, of exactly how dependent the Autobots were on the U.S. government for equipment, supplies, and housing. They’d gotten better funding and equipment after Megatron’s invasion of Jasper, but she wouldn’t be surprised to learn that Optimus still had to walk a fine line at times.

Thankfully, Miko picked up on the first try.

“Um, hi, Mrs. Darby, uh, I am so glad you called me when I am on a free period,” Miko rattled off, in a mechanical, rehearsed way that told June she was lying through her teeth. Well, June wasn’t Miko’s mother or even her host mother, and quite frankly had more significant problems right now.

“Miko, I need you to listen and do what I tell you,” June said firmly in her best Mom voice, cutting the teenager off from any further explanations or excuses. “Call Bulkhead,” she was sure Ratchet hadn’t given Miko a way to contact the doctor directly, “and tell him Ratchet needs to call me, on my cell, right away.”

“Uh – okay? I can do that. But what’s up?”

“Just make sure Ratchet knows to get hold of me, and do it as soon as possible, alright? Thanks, Miko. Bye!” June hung up hastily, hoping to hear from Ratchet _very_ soon.

“I certainly hope you’re more useful than you sound,” Knock Out said snidely.

Yeah. June hoped so too.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> June needs Knock Out to get to Ratchet, but that can only happen if MECH doesn't get to them first...

Fortunately for June, Miko did what she was told, and June’s phone rang within minutes.

“Mrs. Darby.” Ratchet sounded vaguely annoyed at being interrupted in whatever he’d been doing, and June had never been so glad to hear his voice. “Miko said you wanted me to call you.”

“Yes, thank you, Ratchet, it’s…” June hesitated, then sighed. “It’s just easier to put you on speaker and let him tell you.”

“…let _who_ tell me what?” Ratchet asked, voice fading as she took the phone away from her ear and tapped the ‘speakerphone’ icon. She could hear him at normal volume again on the last word.

“Knock Out needs your help,” she said quickly.

“ _What_?” Any annoyance fled Ratchet’s voice, replaced instantly with concern. “June, are you hurt? In danger?”

“Your pet human is fine,” Knock Out said, sounding put out that he wasn’t someone’s first concern.

“Knock Out, I don’t know what you want but if you – “

“Oh, can the dramatics, Autobot. I _saved_ her from some mutual _friends_ of ours – they like dark cars, matching uniforms, experimenting on Cybertronians – and I haven’t done anything.” An unspoken ‘yet’ hung in the air. “MECH did something to me, and I’m stuck in car form. If you want your human back, you’ll meet me at these coordinates,” weird characters scrolled across the suddenly black screen of the phone then vanished, “and bring your medical kit.”

“Are you bringing any other Decepticons with you?”

“Noooo, not that I expect you to believe me, just like _I_ don’t believe that _you_ would show up all by your lonesome either.”

“I – “

“Look, bring whoever you want, just _fix this_.” Knock Out was clearly annoyed and June hoped it didn’t mean things were about to go badly for her. “You fix me, I give you the human, and we all go our separate ways like two happy mechanisms, and one happy little squishy.”

“I’ll meet you at the coordinates shortly. June,” Ratchet addressed her in the calm, reassuring voice she’d used and heard used a thousand and more times at the hospital, “everything will be alright. We’ll have you out of there shortly.”

“I know you will Ratchet,” June said, trying to be equally reassuring. “Thank you.”

June ended the call and, not knowing what else to do with it, put it away in her purse. She didn’t particularly want to talk to Knock Out, even if she could think of anything to say, and the feeling was probably mutual. She wrapped her arms around herself and tried to distract herself by looking out the window at the scenery whipping by.

They’d used to go on drives when Jack was small. She’d sung songs to him and played travel games while his father drove, making the occasional dad joke and even more rarely chiming in on a song. They hadn’t made a road trip together in – it had to be ten years. June promised herself that if – _when_ she got out of this she and Jack would load up the car with terrible food and sodas and take a trip somewhere together. A family trip, just the two of them. They were long overdue.

“Uh oh.” Knock Out finally broke the tense and awkward silence. “Looks like our friends are back.”

June looked up and into Knock Out’s rear-view mirror, seeing two dark Humvees trailing them. “How much further to where you’re meeting Ratchet?”

“Too far,” Knock Out said grimly. “I can try to lose them, but if I were going to attach a control device of any kind to someone, and I’m not saying I have, I’d include a tracker. I’ll do my best. Hang on!”

June didn’t quite catch a small, startled noise when Knock Out suddenly accelerated, changing rapidly between lanes, weaving in and out of traffic, even driving on the shoulder when he had to. She wrapped her hands around the seat belt and tried to think calm thoughts. Horns blared all around them, from drivers who were furious at being cut off. Looking in the rear-view again June saw that the cars behind them were pulling in tight together, helping to block the Humvees from getting any closer. If she could only get rid of the device and its tracker somehow, she –

“Vince,” she said aloud, suddenly remembering something Jack had told her. “Of course!”

“Whatever you’re babbling about had better be useful.”

“Ah – you captured a human during a drag race,” June said quickly, looking over Knock Out’s dashboard for any hint of where the device she was thinking of could be. “Remember?”

“ _Of_ _course_ I remember. My memory specs would make one of your so-called ‘supercomputers’ _weep_ with envy. What’s that got to do with anything?” Knock Out snapped.

“You shocked him with something,” June said rapidly. “If you shock the device maybe it’d short it somehow.”

“Well, anything’s worth a shot,” he admitted grudgingly. “If I can access – there!” Something June wouldn’t have wanted to see in any other situation unfolded from what looked like the passenger-side glove compartment. “Hold out your arm and try not to twitch too much.”

“Like I’ve got a choice,” June muttered but obeyed. The claw-like device Knock Out had just transformed out snapped closed around her wrist and it _hurt_ , electricity shooting up her arm, and –

“Ohhh,” June moaned, coming to. She raised a hand to her face. “What…? How…?”

She’d been hoping it was a dream, but that idea was demolished when Knock Out answered her.

“Shorting out the device shorted you out as well. But it might have done the trick. I haven’t seen so much as a headlight glint from our would-be welcoming committee since.” He sounded as smug as if it had been his idea. June let it go. “Don’t go getting ideas about me letting you out, though. I still can’t transform, so you’re my insurance until Ratchet fixes me. And I’m certainly not showing up without you.”

June rubbed at her wrist, soothing it even though it didn’t really feel numb or tingly. The device might be inactive, but it hadn’t unlocked yet. It felt looser, or maybe that was just her imagination, but she couldn’t get it over her hand. _Dammit_. Not that she had any way out of Knock Out, but she would have felt better with it off, at least. She wondered if Knock Out still being unable to transform was caused by the device she was wearing or by whatever MECH had done to him. Either way, she hoped Ratchet would be able to undo it soon.

“How – “

“I _swear to Primus_ if what you’re about to say is any variation on ‘are we there yet’ I will shock you into reboot again and _keep_ shocking you till we’re at the rendezvous.”

Alright, then. June chose the better part of valour and folded her hands in her lap, watching the scenery again and trying not to think about the machine holding her hostage – either of them.

***

The spot Knock Out had chosen for a rendezvous was one of the old ghost towns that dotted rural Nevada. The road to it wasn’t paved, had probably never been, and Knock Out complained about the damage being done to his finish the whole way. June bit the inside of her lower lip, worrying at it, an old nervous tic she thought she’d ditched in college. What if Ratchet had been held up? What if they hadn’t really ditched MECH? What if Decepticons found them before Ratchet could fix Knock Out? What if, what if, what if…?

 _Just calm down, June,_ she told herself. _Focus on the positive. Ratchet will be there. He’ll fix this. You can go home and hug Jack and do something to relax. A bubble bath, maybe, and an Audrey Hepburn movie. Breakfast at Tiffany’s? No…Roman Holiday. That’s the one. A fun road trip movie. Maybe open that bottle of wine Alice gave you at Christmas. If ever you deserved a drink after a long day…_

Run-down buildings slowly came into view on the horizon. The ground in front of one of them looked like it had been recently disturbed. It was a large, barn-like building that would be a logical place for two Cybertronians to meet if they didn’t want to be seen. Knock Out seemed to agree because he rolled toward it, eased himself inside.

June could have wept with gratitude to see Ratchet’s bulky red-and-white form waiting inside.

“I came alone,” Ratchet said, looking at June through Knock Out’s windshield. “I’m willing to repair you, but first let the human go.”

“Of course,” Knock Out said smoothly. “That was our agreement, wasn’t it?” He released June’s seatbelt and opened the driver’s side door. June got out, fast, and went quickly over to Ratchet.

“June,” Ratchet said, dropping to one knee and placing one huge hand between her and Knock Out. He wasn’t touching her, but it made her feel _much_ safer. “Are you alright? Have you been harmed?”

June managed a smile, wrapping one arm across her torso and gripping the opposite elbow. “I’m fine. Just a little stressed.”

Ratchet frowned slightly, looking her over. “I’m reading excess electrical activity on your right arm. Are you certain you’re alright?”

“Yes,” she assured him. “Knock Out did shock me but it was at my request,” she added hastily, seeing Ratchet’s frown begin to deepen. “MECH was following us, and we had to disrupt the tracker in,” she showed him the device, “this.”

Ratchet, very carefully, lifted her arm a little higher using the smallest finger on the hand that wasn’t shielding her to better examine the device. Behind them, Knock Out made a noise remarkably like someone clearing their throat for attention that both Ratchet and June ignored.

“Yes, interesting,” Ratchet said slowly. “Clever, in its own way.”

“Yes, yes, very clever of the little monkeys, I’m sure,” Knock Out said impatiently. “Can you _fix_ whatever it did to me?”

“Hmm? Oh, yes, yes, it shouldn’t be a problem.”

June followed Ratchet over to Knock Out, absently fiddling with the device on her arm as Ratchet did something that looked a lot more like mechanics than medicine to June’s eye. Not that there was much of a difference with this patient, she supposed. She only knew when he was finished when Knock Out abruptly transformed. June took a hasty step back, and Ratchet scooped her up protectively. It was the first time he’d so much as touched her, and June was distantly surprised to find he was warm. She supposed she shouldn’t be. Metal or not, he was alive after all.

“ _Finally_ ,” the Decepticon groaned, stretching. “Well, it’s been a slice, but I must be going.”

“Hyep, ep ep!” Ratchet interrupted. “Not just yet. I still need to disconnect you from the device attached to June. It’s separate from the transformation lock.”

“Ugh, fine! Just hurry up!”

Ratchet set June down, gently, in the hayloft. “I’ll just be a minute. Try to relax, you’ve had a stressful day.”

June managed a small smile. “No kidding. Not the road trip I had planned.”

Ratchet didn’t smile back; she got the feeling he was scanning her again. “I imagine not. Wait there.”

*

Ratchet fortified his firewalls, making sure that the connection between himself and Knock Out only worked one way, and cabled up to Knock Out at data transfer level to scan the Decepticon’s systems. Unfortunately, as basic as it was, it still permitted a level of communication.

‘ _Don’t you Autobots have something about medical privacy?’_

Ratchet narrowed his linguistic response protocols, ensuring he would transmit only the most necessary glyphs back to Knock Out. He didn’t need to include any kind of emotional glyph or glyph marker for this.

‘ _She can’t see what I’m doing, nor would she understand it if she could. Stay quiet while I scan you.’_

Knock Out didn’t bother limiting his own linguistic protocols. Ratchet could feel a sly interest in the other doctor’s response. ‘ _Keeping secrets? Doesn’t seem very Autobot of you._ _Or don’t you trust your human allies?_ ’

Ratchet pointedly didn’t respond, chasing down the malicious code infecting Knock Out. He tracked it back to a cluster of human-made nanomachines infecting the lower levels of Knock Out’s communications suite. They were a level of sophistication above what Ratchet had thought to be possible for humanity, suggesting they were pale copies of nanomachines sourced from a Cybertronian. Breakdown, most likely. Once he realized that, it was easy enough to transmit a standard kill code to them, shutting them down.

 _‘I’ve turned off the infectious nanomachines MECH injected into you,_ ’ he informed Knock Out. ‘ _Your internal maintenance systems will recycle them within the next day or so. Here,’_ he transmitted data, ‘ _are their schematics so you can work on an inoculation._ ’

‘ _Helping the enemy, doctor? Would_ Optimus _approve?’_

‘ _Optimus would approve of preventing suffering, which is what I assume would happen to any Cybertronian unfortunate enough to fall into MECH’s clutches.’_

Knock Out flinched: just barely, but it was there, and Ratchet filed the reaction away for future use. ‘ _Indeed, but if you’re quite done…’_

_‘I just want – ‘_

Behind them, June cried out in surprise and pain.

*

June paced while Ratchet worked, stretching out the kinks of sitting so long and getting rid of some of her nervous energy. Whatever the two Cybertronians were doing, they were doing it silently. Ratchet’s body blocked her view of his hands, and she didn’t pace a wide enough area she might see, respecting his desire for privacy. It made for a small, tight circle but she was okay with that.

 _It’s almost done,_ she reminded herself. _Remember, bubble bath, Roman Holiday, wine. Or – I still have the hotel room booked, if Ratchet would ground bridge me back to my car I’ll still be able to attend the reunion. Might have to watch a different movie but I_ _’m still good on the other two_ _…and it’d be a shame to lose the deposit on the room. MECH doesn’t know to find me there, either. I need to replace some of my clothes and shoes, Carson City has more shops than Jasper… And I could_ definitely _use the vacation!_

To distract herself, June started a list in her head of things she needed to replace. Ratchet hadn’t told her what he was doing, but he hadn’t really moved since he’d started it. Maybe something to do with software? June knew as little about Cybertronian medicine as Ratchet had known about human medicine when they met. She didn’t know that much about computers or software either so that probably put her at more of a disadvantage. Heck, _Raf_ must know more about what Ratchet did as the Autobot’s medic than she did!

Although – she rubbed at her wrist again – maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to learn.

The device on her wrist felt tighter than it had before, and she frowned down at it. Surely it was her imagination?

Ratchet shifted his weight, ever so slightly. June thought he must be almost done with Knock Out. Good, that meant that getting this thing off her would be the next –

The device clamped down tight on her wrist, _too_ tight, and she cried out. Ratchet whipped around, with the speed that always surprised her when she thought about how _big_ the Autobots were.

“June! What is it?” Ratchet demanded, reaching out to her and then hesitating because he apparently didn’t know what to do.

“I-it’s getting tight!” June gasped, prying at it. “Too tight. Ratchet, I – “

“Let me see,” he ordered, and June held out her arm, even though her instincts screamed at her to hug it to her instead.

“Oh, for…” she heard Knock Out say in the distance, and then there was the sound of – what _was_ that?

Something red and quick, something _whirring_ and _loud,_ flashed in front of her and the pressure released from her arm, the device falling, bouncing off the edge of the hayloft and plunging unheeded to the floor. June stumbled backward, staring wide-eyed at the _giant freaking chainsaw_ the Decepticon was wielding, just before Ratchet’s shoulder filled her vision, blocking her view of Knock Out, chainsaw and all.

“ _Are you insane?_ ” Ratchet barked. “Do you have any idea what that could _do_ to a human?”

Knock Out huffed, and there was the sound of something transforming. “ _Please_ , the human is fine! I have excellent control. You can probably still even get something out of that thing if you want.”

Ratchet spluttered. June tried to bring her heart rate down by forcing herself to take deep breaths.

“You helped get me free of MECH, I helped _you_ get free of MECH,” Knock Out continued blithely. “We’re even now, human. Let’s _not_ do this again, hmm?”

Ratchet blocked Knock Out from June’s view – and vice versa – as Knock Out transformed and sped off. Ratchet stayed put until well past the point the sound of Knock Out’s engine had faded, then turned around. Ratchet muttered something June didn’t quite catch, and which might not even have been in English.

“Are you alright, June?” he asked with concern, peering down at her.

June managed a smile. “I-I’m fine.” She gestured at her newly-freed wrist. “Not even a scratch. I…guess Knock Out really does have excellent control.”

“Well. So long as you’re not injured.” Ratchet bent down and picked up the MECH device, then straightened back up and held out a hand for her to climb into. “Let’s go back to the base, and I’ll bridge you home.”

“Um, actually, if you can bridge me back to my car I’ll have time to make it to my high school reunion. Probably. If that’s alright?” June asked.

Ratchet kept her cupped carefully in his hand as he called for a ground bridge. “Oh, I think we can do better than ‘probably!’”

June managed a shaky smile and leaned against his thumb. “Thanks, Ratchet.”

“Yes, well,” he huffed, not making eye contact, as he stepped through the ground bridge. “You have had a long day.”

“No kidding.” June let her shoulders slump. “I’ve never looked forward to an evening relaxing with Audrey Hepburn so much.”

“Who?”

**Author's Note:**

> There [may once have been an actual Jasper, NV](https://books.google.ca/books?id=6mL12N7yhgwC&pg=PA243&lpg=PA243&dq=jasper+nevada&source=bl&ots=K8re61zNy0&sig=RbC7RBJuc9k7WUQEl0gdfG9yAkg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjkrM2wvvXcAhVvs1kKHYQPAqk4ChDoATAEegQIBhAB#v=onepage&q=jasper%20nevada&f=false), though it seems to now be abandoned. I’m using the real-life approximate location of that Jasper, near [Spruce Mountain, NV](https://www.google.com/maps/place/Spruce+Mountain/@40.4668889,-118.8372393,7z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x80aefcbd28d81a01:0xebc8c37738a60287!8m2!3d40.5524281!4d-114.8217002) for the fictional one. Carson City is on the other side of the state, so it seemed a decent distance away.
> 
> “The Bystander Effect occurs when the presence of others discourages an individual from intervening in an emergency situation.” – [Psychology Today](https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/basics/bystander-effect). In essence, no one does anything because they assume someone else will and/or because no one else is doing so. So always check and/or call for assistance (if and when it’s safe to do so.)


End file.
